by Fiona Faris
Lorraine looked up at the man she loved with so much love in her eyes.
“I will ne’er be the type to sit and be quiet, Daividh. I want to help people-”
“-and animals,” he added.
“And animals,” she agreed with a smile.
“I would nae want ye want ye anyway else. Ye are perfect for me – just the way ye are.”
“Daividh?”
“Aye?”
“Kiss me.”
“With pleasure, milady.”
Epilogue
Lorraine closed her eyes and opened them. Then, she closed her eyes and opened them again. Nothing had changed. She pinched herself as hard as she could and doused her face with water. Apart from her reddened skin from the pinch, there was no change.
“’Tis really happenin’,” she said to herself, as she sat in her night robe on her bed, “I am getting’ married.” She grinned widely, thoughts of Daividh filling her mind. She hadn’t imagined herself as someone who would get married. However, life was always there to change the plans that people had written for themselves. She sobered up wishing that her father could be present. She had no doubt that he would be proud of her and Maxwell. Maxwell had replaced Glenn, who had been exiled to England. She had feared that the loss would affect Daividh but it hadn’t.
Her mother had cried softly when she had told her the news. When Lorraine had asked her why, she had wiped her tears and told her that she was so happy that her father had children he would be proud of.
Planning the wedding had been tedious. In the end, she and Daividh had left it to Elsa and Mairi. The pair had had a field day with preparations and Lorraine had been happy that they got along so well.
The door opened suddenly, and Lorraine’s head turned sharply to the intruder. She calmed once she saw Daividh step in through the door.
“Hi,” she whispered.
“Ye are up still,” he said, and closed the door behind himself.
“Aye,” she said, and watched him walk up to her bed.
“Ye are nae supposed to be here,” she grinned at him, making space on the bed.
“Perhaps,” he shrugged and sat beside her, “But how was I supposed to sleep knowing that ye are just a few meters away. I need ye.” He reached for her.
“We wed tomorrow,” she reminded him, but she was reaching for him too.
Daividh undid the belt of her robe and slipped a hand inside. He felt her firm and large breasts and caressed them lovingly.
Lorraine closed her eyes as his lips claimed hers. His kiss was hot and urgent, and she felt her excitement grow at his touch.
“Touch me,” she begged.
Daividh obliged her request with his lips. He trailed a path down her lips to her neck and suckled on a spot he chose.
Lorraine’s hand slipped into his hair and grabbed fistfuls.
Daividh’s kiss went lower still to her breasts. Lorraine felt his soft beard on her skin as a shiver ran down her spine in anticipation. Lorraine felt her need grow. The urgency of it filled her, almost making her dizzy.
She wanted him then but she knew he would take his time. She couldn’t wait – she would wait. Lorraine pulled his hand down until it was right where she wanted. She wriggled her body and when her hips were where she needed, she lowered herself unto his fingers.
His sexy laugh rang out.
“Ye want me, do ye nae?”
Lorraine didn’t reply. His fingers were working magic in her and her moans were increasing.
“Answer me, or I’ll stop.”
His smugness would have annoyed her on any other day but not then. Her need for him was so great that she would have said anything, everything, just so he continued.
“No,” she pleaded, “please, don’t stop.”
Lorraine held on to him with hunger that surpassed anything she had ever felt. Her want for him beclouded her senses and she felt she would die for wanting him.
Faster, she wanted to beg, faster. But she was a proud woman and he saw that. He wanted her submission, her request. Lorraine was close to giving it – so close.
She pulled away from him, hating the empty feeling she felt without his fingers in her. She held on to his shoulders and pushed him on to the bed beneath her. Shrugging out from her robe, she sat astride him locking him between her thighs. With a rush he hadn’t seen before, she undid his breeches until his erect shaft was free.
Lorraine eyed it. She wanted to taste it in her mouth – but it would be later. Her hunger was for him – inside her.
With eyes hooded with lust, she smirked down on him and moved her body on him until she was in the perfect position. Her eyes locked onto his and slowly, she lowered herself onto his shaft. She felt him feel every inch of her until she felt she could take no more – yet there was more of him still.
“Ye can, love,” he said, and thrust slowly into her.
Lorraine gasped at the fullness of him. Daividh’s hand fitted at her waist and brought her down unto him even as he thrust.
Slowly, they found a rhythm. Her moans rang out accompanied by his heavy grunts. They were beautiful together, and even in the haze of their lust and love for each other, it was clear as day to them both.
Soon, the pace increased and their pants grew faster and louder.
Lorraine felt her peak near. The addictive feeling started small and grew until Lorraine could swear that she felt her head spin.
“Daividh,” she moaned. “I am going to explode – oh!”
Their thrusts grew even faster.
“Come with me, me love,” he coaxed, “Come with me.”
Her orgasm took her like a welcome surprise. Her hips tightened and triggered his orgasm. As he poured his seed into her, he held onto her, never wanting her to go. Together, they basked in the beauty of their love and lust.
When they had calmed and lay together, Daividh pulled her to him and placed a kiss on her forehead.
“We have to do that again.”
Lorraine grinned. “We have forever.”
The End?
Extended Epilogue
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Afterword
Thank you for reading my novel, Highlander’s Sinister Bet. I really hope you enjoyed it! If you did, could you please be so kind to write a review HERE?
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Do you want more Romance?
Turn on the next page to read the first chapters of my latest best-selling novel: Highlander’s Winter Rose
This is the story of Rosallyn, the illegitimate daughter of a powerful general, and Maximus, a Highlander who lost everything. After Rosallyn finds him half-dead, she heals his wounds and brings him back to life. The desire between them is strong, but Maximus is on a mission to gain back his family's Lairdship from usurpers. And to accomplish that, he must marry another...
Highlander’s Winter Rose
Prologue
Pain sliced through his mind as Maximus Mackay felt the first arrow find its place in the flesh of his back. He cried out, but gripped the reins of his horse even tighter, not allowing himself to fall off as he continued to ride off into the night. The smell of blood filled the air, and his mind was in disarray. How could things have gone so wrong? He could feel the warm blood oozing out of his new injury and flowing down his back. He screamed at himself in his head, Ignore the pain! Ignore it, ye need to escape!
The ambitious enemy soldier who had been chasing him down took the opportunity, after his falter from getting shot, to ride up on his left and, with a loud battle-cry, slash at him with his sword. Unable to react quickly enough to block the attack with his swo
rd, he was forced to make a swift block with his short dagger. He unsheathed the small blade and held it up to parry. The blow glanced off the blade of his dagger, but was so strong, it knocked the dagger out of his hand, and the sword cut through his left forearm, causing an injury that was sure to leave a grotesque scar.
Furious he attacked with his sword arm, lodging his blade into the man’s throat just as another arrow buried itself into his back. With a growl of pain, he dislodged his sword from the soldier’s body, swaying as he struggled to stay atop his horse. He could not fall here. If he did, then all would truly be lost. His trusty steed, Barny, neighed under pressure as he kicked the horse’s ribs again, pushing it to run faster.
“Run Barny! Ye can dae it, lad! Get us out of here!” His words turned into a scream of pain as yet another arrow hit him. His horse performed its task; its hooves flying over the ground as it took off faster, nostrils flaring steam in the cold night air. The enemy was too far behind him to catch up any time soon. He had killed the one man who had caught up with him. Now all he needed was to escape from the range of their archers.
Faither… brother…
The fingers in his left hand felt stiff as he held on to the reins with all his might, ignoring the pain in his arm from the large cut that was bleeding out of his sleeve. He swore, slapping himself to stay awake as his horse continued to push the limits, racing away from the danger behind them. He was not sure where he was headed, but he needed to get away. The idea was to reach a border town, or the neighboring clan to find help.
“It is an ambush! We have been betrayed! I will take what men I have left and clear a path for ye. Ye must run! Leave the clan. I will be right behind ye. Nay, if they are here then… I dinnae think that yer father and yer brother survived. Ye must leave now! Ye are all we have left, and there are too many of them. Ye are too important to die here today. Ye must live to fight another day!”
He remembered the words General Grant had yelled when the attack began. He had protested. He knew the General was right, but he did not want to believe it. Unfortunately, he was not even allowed to hope, as moments later he saw the usurper sitting atop his horse proudly, with the bodies of his father and brother tied to his horse behind him.
Maximus realized that he was still more of a boy than he had thought as in the heat of battle he could not think objectively, wanting nothing more than to run to his father and brother, despite knowing that they were already dead. It was with tears in his eyes that he watched the General fall from his horse, swarmed by enemy soldiers, after smacking Maximus’s own horse, and sending him off in the direction of the border.
He promised that he would be right behind me… Faither, brother…
He was in anguish, but he did not even have the luxury of mourning. The enemy was probably right behind him. With his father and brother gone, he was the only one left with a right to the Lairdship. There was no way the usurper would allow him to escape easily. He knew the routes to take to hide his movements, but that only meant that he was riding for longer. He rode through the night, finally reaching a border village by midnight.
He rode into the woods to avoid soldiers who might be on the road out of the clan. If the Lairdship had been usurped, it was safe to assume that the soldiers at the border would not be on his side. It was dark, with only the moon to guide him, and he slowed his horse to a walk in the dense forest so as not to injure it and himself. He constantly had to move his head to avoid low-hanging branches. Luckily, Barny was intelligent and avoided trees on his own while staying in the direction Maximus wanted him to go.
Now that Maximus was no longer galloping, and he was not bouncing around with the desperation to escape pumping in his veins, it became much clearer to him how tired and lightheaded he was. The pain from his injuries had become dull aches, but he had lost too much blood. He was getting sleepy… too sleepy.
The last thing he remembered was the painful snap of his ankle as he fell off the horse, his foot tangling in the stirrups at an odd angle, and lights exploding behind his eyes before fading into darkness.
Chapter One
“I am leavin’ now, grandmother. I promise to come see ye down at the monastery later.” Her auburn curls bounced as Rosallyn Grant shook her head before packing her hair up with a ribbon to keep the strands off her shoulders and face. The hair acted as though it had a life of its own, and after several hair-related incidences during her frolics in the woods, she learned that it was better to restrain it. She picked up the basket she had put on the ground and glanced back into the house where her grandmother was shuffling out of her bedroom with sleepy eyes. She smiled fondly as the old woman rubbed her face tiredly.
“Ye are leavin’ already me darlin’? It isnae even sunrise yet,” her grandmother said, peeking outside through the windows. It had been a whole month since her grandmother had slept at the house, so she knew that she would have wanted to spend more time together before she left again. Her grandmother helped with the sick at the monastery, so she only came to stay at the house once every month now that Rosallyn was an adult.
“Ye ken that I prefer to be early, grandmother. I like the quiet in the woods when it has nae woken up yet.” She pointed out, turning to leave. “I made ye pottage for the day, so ye dinnae have to cook when ye get to the monastery. See ye soon!”
With those words she set off, making her way into the woods with a bounce in her step. She breathed in the slightly moist morning air. Winter was coming soon; she could tell from the coolness that made her hug her cloak to herself and the sparse whiteness on the ground from early snow.
Rosallyn was a winter child, born with the beauty of the season etched into her features: eyes the color of the evergreen trees, skin as white as snow, and her lips as red as holly berries. It was said that her mother took one look at her and whispered her name, Rosallyn, saying she was like a single red rose in winter.
She saw a deer dart off towards the stream as she approached and angled her head to one side to dodge a low-hanging branch.
Ah, I cannae wait for the first day of winter. I miss faither.
She ignored the slight pang of her heart at the thought and continued on the forest path that her feet had beaten into the ground over the years. She loved the winter because it was the only time that her family would be complete. Her mother had died when she was very young, and although to the villagers the only family Rosallyn had left was her grandmother, this was untrue. She was the illegitimate daughter of Robert Grant, the General of their clan who was still very much alive.
The product of a love affair, Rosallyn could not live with her father as a noble and needed to live with her grandmother in their isolated little village instead. Her father loved her dearly, despite her status as an illegitimate child, and visited her often. However, it was during winter that he truly was her father, living in their cottage with them and preparing to celebrate her birthday on the first day of winter. Usually, he would have arrived by now, when the chill was just beginning to permeate the air, but he was just running a little late, she told herself.
Her father spent as much time with her as he could, teaching her ethics, politics, and regaling her with stories of the castle and the battles he led. She hung on to his every word. He was like a shining beacon in her eyes. He had visited them briefly a couple of weeks ago when he came to bring them some of his things in preparation for his stay and supplies that would keep them living comfortably.
He did not stay long, only having time to hug her and talk briefly while the servants offloaded the things that he had brought with him, taking them into the house. He told her of a brewing war and mentioned that he had decided to bring his things over early because the battle might take his time, so he would be a bit late for her birthday.
Ye are only nervous because father told ye he was preparin’ for war. He told ye he would return, did he nae?
Her father had indeed promised to return, assuring her that although he might be late, he would be there at
the beginning of winter and he would have more stories for her after defeating the enemy. He had also promised, with a grin, to return with Boyd Tod, the only person from her father’s life as a noble who cared that she existed. The nobles knew of her as her father did not hide her existence, but they did not know her. She blushed at the memory of her father’s teasing looks as he told her what a handsome man Boyd had grown up to be.
Boyd was the handsome soldier boy who had come to the village with her father when she was fourteen. His being fifteen at the time, the two had been instantly infatuated with each other, blushing through every conversation and doing their best not to do anything embarrassing in the presence of the other.